Start of the Christmas Season

Like I said in my last post, our holiday season has been fast and furious, with hardly time to come up for air, but it's all been things I enjoyed doing!

We got invited to attend CARTI's Festival of Trees with some friends, which was a really fun event. Some of the trees were spectacularly decorated and the survivors cancer stories were truly inspiring, what a great cause!

There's been normal bedtime routines with reading the Bible and remembering scripture.


Mom and Dad got tickets for us all to see the Rep's rendition of Little Mermaid. The costumes and set decorations were amazing.  I have to say The Rep did a great job with this show, the kids had a terrific time! (Pascha, we sure missed you, so sorry you were sick sweet girl!)

We have been looking for a boat for some time now and Adam finally found one that would allow us to ski and wakeboard while also taking another family along with us.  So Adam got an early Christmas present that we all will enjoy next summer!  We picked it up two weeks ago and drove it down to Hot Springs, the kids were beside themselves with excitement! We're looking forward to making more family memories!

Then there was the annual Santa brunch. The kids enjoyed the hot egg nog, candy canes and of course talking to Santa.


We had someone take a quick picture, its not the greatest, but we got it.

We enjoyed eating dinner with our friends Shana and Cache.  My boys love playing with Cache, chasing up and down the halls is a favorite past time!  This year we made reindeer ornaments together.  We love these two and are thankful for their friendship!

Our D-group from church had a tacky Christmas party, which is hard for me…I don't do tacky well. Adam convinced me that I needed to go "full out" and not just do an ugly Christmas sweater with jeans, so we went with these hideous Christmas pajamas. We started with dinner catered from Oceans. Nothing says "Merry Christmas" like a Godzilla sushi roll, it is my FAVORITE, if you've not gotten it, try it next time! Thanks to Keri, each couple had the opportunity to pick an ornament with a name of God on it and then go around and share what that name has meant to us this past year.  I really enjoyed this portion of the evening.  Our ornament was "Christ is Lord".  We shared about how thankful we are that Christ is Lord of our home.  Sometimes, with normal fleshly reactions and sin that so easily jumps out in the context of every day living, Adam and I are grateful that both of us have Christ as Lord, because without Him, it would be hard to forgive and offer forgiveness to one another.  Because we have both experienced God's forgiveness (over and over) we are more easily (but certainly not perfectly) able to offer that same forgiveness to each other, our kids and others we come in contact with each day.  And in this year where we have honestly been busier then ever before, we have found it so comforting to know that "Christ is Lord" when the going gets tough, when days are long, trials are never ceasing and conflicts arise.  Thankfully we have "Christ the Lord" to lean into and on when life is just hard with kids, their activities, school, work events, marriage and family.  I'm so thankful that Christ the Lord, our Savior, was born!

This year I am the Staff Appreciation Chairman at the boys school.  Since I really enjoy planning parties I thought this would be a fun job for me.  It was (and is) a lot to plan each month, but December had a lot going on.  I planned a luncheon for 100 teachers and staff, but it was great to give back to them for all they do for my kiddos!   We truly have a great school and I so appreciate all that they do to teach my children, keep them safe and watch over them each and every day of the week!  My friend Emily helped me do the mailbox treats for all the staff, then we set up for the monthly staff meeting and also pulled off a lovely staff luncheon all in one week!

Each Christmas, Adam enjoys helping to plan the Heart Hospitals Christmas party.  This year had a record attendance, I think there was over 500 people at the Embassy Suites. Vicky and her team do an awesome job of decorating and planning for the hospital wide party.  The past two years they've done an American Idol style talent competition.  From a Scottish bagpipe player to singers and dancers, the AHH team's got talent for sure.  There are many door prizes given throughout the evening from gift cards to an iPad mini, culminating in the winner of the competition receiving a ticket for a cruise.  This year there was a guest singer.  You may have heard of Sam Hunt, the Country R&B singer, well his talented "brother" made an appearance and gave a slammin' performance if I do say so myself, though I am slightly biased because I happen to be married to "Slam".  "Slam" wrote a song about Coby's Place, the new cafeteria at the Heart Hospital as well as all the different diet plans the cardiologists believe in.  The video of his performance is too long to upload to here with Flickr so you'll have to go watch it on my Facebook page.

I'm grateful for these two men who Adam gets to work along side each day, they're both hilariously funny and men of character, so thankful for their friendship to Adam.

So, as you can see, our start to the Christmas season has been packed with fun and memories and I'm  so thankful for each one!  I'm loving all the Christmas cards that keep pouring in each day!  It's one of my favorite things about Christmas time!